The classes you can play as in WildStar are pretty unique, but they still have similarities to classes you’ve seen in other games. The revamped character creation does a better job than before at letting you see how each class plays, but it is still hard to pick one without experience.
I’ve played each class enough to give you a decent idea of how they play. I’ll help you decide by giving details on each class, how difficult I find each, and how similar they are to classes in other games you are more familiar with.
Please visit my What’s different between P2P and F2P guide if you are just starting or getting back into WildStar.
This guide will go over all WildStar‘s classes including:
- Basic Class and Path Info – What you need to know while in character creation.
- Warrior – How this class plays, what they use, and similar classes.
- Engineer – How this class plays, what they use, and similar classes.
- Stalker – How this class plays, what they use, and similar classes.
- Medic – How this class plays, what they use, and similar classes.
- Spellslinger – How this class plays, what they use, and similar classes.
- Esper – How this class plays, what they use, and similar classes.
Basic Class and Path Info
One thing to keep in mind is that some classes are only available to certain races. Humans and Cassians can be any class, but the other races have restrictions. Below is the list of classes each race can choose from.
Exile
- Granok – Warrior, Engineer, Medic
- Mordesh – Warrior, Engineer, Medic, Stalker, Spellslinger
- Aurin – Esper, Spellslinger, Stalker
Dominion
- Mechari – Engineer, Medic, Stalker, Warrior
- Draken – Spellslinger, Stalker, Warrior
- Chua – Engineer, Esper, Medic, Spellslinger
You can also get a glimpse of what mid and endgame gear looks like for each class.
Paths
A path is a separate thing you pick when creating a character. Any class and race can pick any path. Think of this like a side class you can level up as well, similar to professions.
- Explorer – This path involves exploring Nexus by finding secret areas, placing beacons, and more.
- Scientist – This path scans various objects and collects data to find out more about the planet Nexus.
- Settler – This path involves collecting materials to build helpful expansions such as stat and experience boosts for a short time for yourself and other players.
- Soldier – This path involves a lot of fighting. Assassinations, waves of enemies, and testing weapons are some of this missions to expect.
Warrior
You’ll see a class like this in nearly every RPG or MMO. This is a melee class that wears heavy armor and can either DPS or Tank.
It has something that makes it stand out from most games, an arm cannon. Some skills use the arm cannon to blast with ranged attacks or grapple enemies to pull them in. Warriors use Kinetic Energy to power their attacks. Certain attacks build it, while others use it.
This is a standard class that is great for beginner’s, but still a top class for end-game content. The damage and heavy armor makes it easier to survive. The innate ability is a cooldown that increases damage and gives you unlimited Kinetic for a short time.
Engineer
This class also wears heavy armor and uses a heavy gun. It can Tank or DPS and has some ranged attacks. They also use robots to help damage, tank, heal, and crowd control.
This class is similar to pet classes in other games, like Hunters in WoW, but with tanking durability and options to not use pets at all in favor of other abilities.
This is an all-around good class for leveling and end-game content. When using bots, the class becomes more difficult and requires more attention.
Stalker
This is your typical rogue/thief class. They use stealth, medium armor, and claw weapons. They can Tank or DPS, so that’s what makes them a bit different from most rogue classes in other games. Tanking usually takes the form of building dodge abilities.
Stalkers have different stances and their innate ability makes them stealth. Their skills use Suit Power, which works just like energy in most games. You start at full, then it goes down as you use skills, and regenerates over time.
When playing DPS, their survivability is lower than most, so you have to kill quickly while playing solo. You’ll want to be good at dodging and moving quickly if you play a Stalker.
Medic
Don’t let the name fool you, this is not just a healing class, it can also spec to full DPS. The use medium armor, use paddles as weapons, and have medium range. The theme of this class is Tron and dubstep.
This class uses a lot of technological skills and buffs for the party. It doesn’t quite match up with any standard classes in other games. The closest class would be a Shaman in WoW.
Since this class can heal and DPS, it is pretty easy to level compared to other classes. They use Actuators to power their attacks. Their innate ability fully charges their Actuators and gives an assault and support power increase when above 30% health, or restores shield and increases shield mitigation when below 30% health.
Spellslinger
This class is a western gunslinger mixed with a spell caster, their guns shoot spells. They are a ranged DPS or healing class that uses light armor and dual pistols.
Their innate ability, Spell Surge, is very special and acts as an extra skill. It does not have a cooldown, instead it has 4 charges that regenerate over time and you can toggle it on and off. Some skills have extra effects when you have spell surge on.
This is a fast-paced class with a lot of movement like Stalker, but Spell Surge ramps up the difficulty. To master this class, you’ll have to master using spell surge on the correct skills and turning it on and off so you optimize the buff on the fly.
The class revolves around this mechanic, so it takes a while to get used to when doing endgame content. This is one of the hardest classes to play in my opinion, but if you can get Spell Surge down, it is not too hard to play.
Esper
This is the other light armor, ranged class that can DPS or heal in WildStar. They use spells and illusions, as well as a Psiblade, to attack. This most similar to a mage or illusionist class.
Espers build up Psi points with some attacks, then spend them on spells called Finishers, similar to the combo system in WoW. Their light armor makes them vulnerable, but they can heal to overcome some of that.
It is a semi-difficult class to level and master. Mastering the class is harder than most because if you don’t manage your Psi points correctly, you’ll lose a lot of DPS, or miss huge opportunities.
Any class can do well in all content, you just need to understand exactly how each class works. As always, playing the class or classes you find the most fun will usually be the best way to go.
You will be more motivated to master a class you love playing, even if it is hard to play, than an easy to play class that you don’t like playing. Look up gameplay videos as well to give you a better idea of how each class turns out.
That’s it for my class overview of WildStar. Hopefully, this gives you a good starting point for each class. Playing each class yourself is still the best way to find out if you like the class or not.
Published: Sep 30, 2015 07:41 am